Gender Inclusion - BSUH Maternity

Please note: As part of our journey towards providing gender inclusive care for everybody we are working on updating the language on all of our resources, including our website and patient information leaflets. We will endeavour to do this as quickly as possible, and thank you for your understanding as we implement these changes.

View a statement from the Trust on supporting inclusive midwifery care.

Gender Inclusion Team

We acknowledge the additional challenges that gender identity can have on pregnancy, birth and infant feeding and recognise the importance of providing inclusive, respectful care to pregnant people and their families.

We are on a journey towards gender inclusive care for everybody during pregnancy, birth and afterwards. This journey is led by members of the trans and non-binary community. We are at the beginning of this process, which will continue over the next few years.

Midwives believe pregnancy and birth are normal, healthy parts of life. The midwife’s role is to support a pregnant person’s journey through each stage of pregnancy, birth, and the early days with their new baby. Midwives believe that you know what is best for you and your baby, and will work together with you to ensure your experience of pregnancy and birth is safe and positive.

The Gender Inclusion Team is keen to talk to you about how we can welcome you into care that is individualised to meet the specific needs of you and your family. Contact us to discuss how we can help you feel safe and supported during your pregnancy, birth and postnatal period. You do not need to be currently pregnant to make contact. Enquiries are welcome from all, whether you are a prospective or currently pregnant trans or non-binary person, a partner or healthcare professional.

We look forward to sharing your journey to parenthood with you.

You can contact us at: uhsussex.genderinclusionmidwives@nhs.net

The Gender Inclusion Team

We have a supportive team available to you to help you on your journey through pregnancy, birth and parenting. Each professional in the team has a specific area of expertise to help provide the best possible care for you and your family.

Gender Inclusion Midwife

Helen Green
Pronouns: She/they

Helen is the Gender Inclusion Midwife at BSUH. She can help provide additional support and care, alongside your routine midwifery care. She brings her lived experience as a non-binary person to her care, alongside her knowledge and skills as midwife. Her goal is to help you understand the care and options that are available to you, individualise your care in response to your particular experience of being trans or non-binary and pregnant, and affirm, celebrate and support your choices. You can find out more about the work she does and what kind of extra support is available further down the page.

Consultant Obstetrician

Heather Brown

Pronouns: She/her

Heather is our Consultant Obstetrician, a doctor who specialises in supporting people who need extra care in their pregnancy and birth. Heather specialises in supporting pregnant people who have mental health issues, or who have fears about giving birth. She is experienced in caring for trans and non-binary pregnant people, and is happy to see any of our clients who need medical or obstetric support regardless of whether this involves physical and/or mental health.

Consultant Neonatologist

Neil Aiton

Pronouns: He/him

Neil is our Consultant Neonatologist, a doctor who specialises in providing care for babies born early or poorly. Neil specialises in supporting people who take medications in pregnancy that may affect the baby/babies. He is experienced in planning any additional monitoring babies may need in pregnancy or after they are born, as well as developing infant feeding plans where parents may need to take medication that may transfer into their milk. In addition, Neil is available to support induced lactation for partners.

Consultant Endocrinologist

Anna Crown

Pronouns: She/her

Anna is our Consultant Endocrinologist, a doctor who specialises in hormones. Anna is available to provide information and support to those may need additional input regarding their hormones in their pregnancy, birth and infant feeding journey.

Speciality Registrar in Sexual & Reproductive Health

Sophie Ross

Pronouns: she/her

Sophie is our Specialist Registrar in Sexual & Reproductive Health. Sophie works at Clinic T, which is the sexual health and contraception service specifically for trans and non-binary people. Sophie is available for pre-conception support and sexual health information and advice.

Additional support available

As your Gender Inclusion Midwife, Helen can provide extra support to you during and following your pregnancy, alongside your regular community midwife appointments. This can include:

Talking about where you would feel most comfortable having your midwife appointments (e.g. at home instead of at a Children’s Centre)
Pronoun alerts on BadgerNet
Company and support at other appointments, such as scans
Personalised birth, feeding and parenting preparation (antenatal classes) at home
Talking about how you would like to birth your baby, and supporting your choice of home birth, hospital birth, or Caesarean birth
Tour of the hospital facilities where you may choose to have your baby
Writing a birth plan, including your language preferences for talking about your body
Developing an infant feeding plan, which may include breastfeeding or chestfeeding or expressing milk

Our goals for gender inclusive perinatal care

As part of the journey to make perinatal care gender inclusive for everybody, we are working on:

Providing safe and supportive clinical care to our trans and non-binary clients
Connecting with the local trans and non-binary community
Training midwives and other health professionals about gender identity and the health care needs of trans and non-binary people in pregnancy, birth and the postnatal period
Developing our services and environment to be more inclusive
Producing guidance on inclusive language and communication

Support for trans and non-binary people patient information leaflet

Gender inclusion resources

As part of our journey to improve perinatal services for all trans and non-binary people we are proud to make our key documents available to other organisations and individuals. We hope they support a wider movement towards gender inclusive care that is safe, supportive and accessible, as well as celebratory and affirming.

External resources for service users and professionals

Gender Inclusion Team

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